


Drive

by Porkchop_Sandwiches



Category: Breaking Bad
Genre: El Camino: A Breaking Bad Movie, Episode: s05e15 Granite State, F/M, Hurt/Comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-27
Updated: 2019-10-27
Packaged: 2021-01-03 03:35:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21172751
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Porkchop_Sandwiches/pseuds/Porkchop_Sandwiches
Summary: “Come on now, Kenny. Not like we can’t afford it. And it’s been--” the blond dead-eyed one lowered his voice and tilted his head away from her but not enough for her not to hear. His face kept the same damn unbothered, shootin’-the-shit, frozen expression. It was like he was some possessed mannequin ready to stab somebody in a JC Penny. --”Like almost six months. You know...even rats gotta screw, right?”Wendy gets taken to the compound and the aftermath.





	Drive

**Author's Note:**

  * For [What_we_are](https://archiveofourown.org/users/What_we_are/gifts).

Wendy always thought flowers were a bunch of horse shit. They were good for maybe a week and then started smelling bad, made her nose and eyes water, and then they died. Who needed them? Why did anyone need a month of April showers for a few pretty, empty promises? 

It was almost September but it sure as hell felt like April. She crossed her arms across her chest, metallic puffy jacket not got enough puff for this gusty-ass desert bum-fuck-nowhere, fenced-off hell-hole she found herself at almost midnight. Place was full of guys with Nazi tattoos. There was at least six or seven of them. What the hell was she doing here?

Oh yeah, it was raining. Not hard, but not misting either, more like an on and off puttering stream. It was like the sky was taking a real long shit on everyone. This kind of weather kept johns away from the Crystal Palace like a hooker with any sense from those big, white Chevy “undercover” cop cars. She didn’t usually take rides from guys, liked to stay close to home. But she was real low on rent. And the one with the mustache driving had given her a hundred bucks and a teenth of Blue up front. 

“What are we doin’ outside still?” Wendy said.

She hadn’t talked since they were at the Palace. Just listened while taking the occasional bump off the flat plane of her wrist from the backseat of their SUV. She’d done more than half of the baggie on the fucking thirty minute ride out here. Mustache and the creepy blond kid fought mostly. Wendy didn’t understand what about except some guy was going to really appreciate her and something about 99 percent. It made her sound like she was somebody’s trip to Dairy Queen after getting a good grade on their spelling test. Fucking weird. 

Mustache nodded to a big tarp spread out a few feet ahead. “You’re here for Little Miss Princess Rat. God knows why, ‘cause my vote was to fucking”--

“Come on now, Kenny. Not like we can’t afford it. And it’s been--” the blond dead-eyed one lowered his voice and tilted his head away from her but not enough for her not to hear. His face kept the same damn unbothered, shootin’-the-shit, frozen expression. It was like he was some possessed mannequin ready to stab somebody in a JC Penny. --”Like almost six months. You know...even rats gotta screw, right?”

Mustache laughed and spit out some chew. “Fuck it. This here is your shit. I’m getting a beer.”

He was chuckling when he walked off to this building sort of close by. 

“I don’t got all night,” Wendy said. 

She wanted to get the hell out of here.

“I’m sorry about that ma’am. Let me just check he’s awake, alright?” 

He flung the whole tarp off all in one go.

“ _ Shit. _ ”

There was somebody down there. She wasn’t really sure what she was expecting. But not this. Maybe she thought she’d be on top of the tarp like they wanted to do it the rain, like some kind of action movie fantasy shit. She didn’t think she’d be fucking some guy in a cage. 

“This a problem, ma’am? Because I remember you sayin’ in the car you’d be keeping this to yourself. No matter what?” He smiled at her. “I don’t want to, but I can always get Uncle Jack involved. Don’t think you want that neither, ma’am.”

He scratched the back of his neck all causal but everything he did and said made her skin feel slimy. 

Wendy set a boot up on one of the bars to get a better look. 

The guy looked tiny. And scared. Head all drooped, sitting on some crappy cot.

It was all disturbing and dark down there. 

But the second that mop of dirty hair tipped back, she made him just from that tiny, little nose. 

Everything else: blue eyes, those lips, even the nervous raise of his right eyebrow were just confirmation she didn’t even need. 

“ _ Jess...Jesus _ ,” she said. Better to pretend like she knew less than she did. Even if it made her feel worse than morning sickness, withdrawal, and a three-week, pissing-blood bladder infection all at once. He looked kind of bloodied-up or like he had been not too long ago. His face was covered in beard and scars. “How the hell am I supposed to get down there without breaking my ankle?”

“It ain’t really that far down. Plus we got a ladder.” 

He started messing with something. She guessed it was a ladder she hadn’t noticed in the dark. And she couldn’t focus on anything when he unlatched the gate and lowered it inside. It took everything in her to not smash this fucker’s head in like an ant farm and let Jesse scatter out right then and there. He had a handgun tucked into the waistband of his jeans, looked like he knew how to use it, probably got off on it. 

“He really been down there”--She tried to remember what he’d said earlier. She was still thrumming head to toe from the crystal,--”down there six months?”

“Don’t really think that’s much your business, ma’am,” he said. “There’s nothing to worry about though. He might look...you know, a little scary but he’s real gentle. He’s practically a puppy. We washed him pretty good the other day too so he’s pretty clean...considering.”

Wendy shrugged him off. “I’ve done worse.”

Sick thing was, she never had done anything this fucking awful. ‘Cause Wendy knew there was no way she could get Jesse out of here. And that made her just as bad as them.

She was shaking so hard she could barely climb down. 

He took the ladder as soon as the heels of her boots hit concrete. Latched them both up inside. The rain had picked up a little.

“Now I’m gonna put the tarp on just half way, and I got someone outside listening in case you try anything, understand?” He shielded his eyes from the drizzling and touched his gun. 

Wendy nodded and he smiled again like he was just holding the door of a Waffle House open for her before he disappeared. 

Her mouth was drier than it had ever been trying to come up with something to say. It almost hurt every damn inch of her just to turn to look at him. But when she did, he was a blur as he yanked her down.

It knocked the wind out of her like somebody punched her in the stomach. Jesse wasn’t hurting her though. He was sobbing into her chest. 

She’d seen him cry before, but this was different. His whole body was heaving and twitching but he was real quiet. Like he’d learned how to do it; cry so hard yet barely make a sound. It made her ache more than anything he could manage to do gripping and squeezing her like he was afraid she was a part of a bad trip or something.

“ _ Wendy _ ,” he whispered. His voice sounded like it had been tarred, feathered, and whipped. “ _ Wendy.” _

Wendy didn’t know what to say ‘cause the old, “Easy Sugar. Everything’s okay,” was more a crock of shit than normal. 

She settled for rubbing his back: scrawny shoulder blades down to just above his tailbone where those dimples were and then up again just like how she knew he used to like it. While it wasn’t ever a too regular thing, he’d for sure broken down before when stuff had gone real bad, when he couldn’t keep it in anymore, when he couldn’t tell her anything. But she could always make it a little better with back-rubs, root beer, blowjobs, crystal and some company, at least for a while. 

She could have used a root beer. Or some pot. Anything to calm the churning in her stomach. 

She felt like she was gonna get sick. It smelled like mud, shit, and rust down here. But the stench from Jesse was part of what was turning her guts wrong side out. It was like the inside of a damn car wash, real strong detergent fumes and chemicals like those assholes used some sort of car soap on Jesse. She bet they sprayed him with one of those strong hoses too that sting you all over. She’d been hosed down before plenty. It hurt like a bitch.

She wasn’t too sure how long he’d been crying, but she figured they didn’t have a whole lot of time.

“They took my purse, Jesse.” She kept her voice low for safety. “Made me keep it in the car. I don’t got anything on me, not even rubbers. Took those too. Didn’t know why until now. But it don’t matter. When the younger one comes back you could pretend to be sleeping. You know the old rolling over dead after you’re done screwing. And...I’ll...I’ll just...fucking claw his fucking eyes out and you can make a run for it. Jesse, we could”--

“No,” Jesse said. “It won’t work. I know.”

She couldn’t tell if she was more spooked by how sure he sounded or by the jagged scar on his face she could now clearly see this close up: raised and long as hell, and white too, like it had been there long enough to try to heal some. 

“You really been down here for….” She changed her mind; no need to poke at a wound. “I could bring somebody back with me. Don’t know how to get here exactly ‘cause it’s so late...and the rain. But I...fuck, I could go to the cops?”

Jesse shook his head, eyes flashing with panic. 

“ _ No _ . Wendy. You don’t know these guys. If like shit didn’t go as planned or whatever they’d go after...they’d hurt…” He started tearing up some more. “Just don’t, okay? You gotta promise me.”

She scowled. “You want me to promise I’ll leave you in a fucking cage?”

He leaned his head back with his jaw set like he used to when he was frustrated, like they were just arguing about whether to watch Maury or Jerry Springer after they just got done fucking, like they’d just talked yesterday. She hadn’t actually seen him in a long time, when she almost poisoned a couple of drug dealers for him. Maybe doing that would have prevented all this. It seemed like nothing she did was ever right, even when it felt like it.

Hell, she’d almost quit hooking the other week. She knew this girl, Santana, got out and had a dad who worked for a cab company that hired a lot of illegals to save money or something. They needed a driver who spoke more than three words of English and Wendy had done more than her share of get-away driving so her name came up from Santana. And Wendy didn’t even have a good excuse or nothing for saying no other than it being different and new. She felt too tired for that shit, too ugly, too old. Didn’t have the drive. 

“Jesse, I got to do something,” she said.

He had this sort of remorseful look on his face, like he had anything to be sorry for. It made her squirm deep down on the inside.

Carefully, she touched the scar on his cheek. 

He flinched but didn’t move away, instead went all stiff like he was waiting for something. When she traced a soft finger down the ridge of it and cupped the side of his face, he relaxed, even nuzzled into her. 

She thumbed his lower lip. 

He kissed her palm.

She took in a sharp breath, couldn’t help it ‘cause he’d never kissed her before. His lips felt nice. No one ever kissed her.

Wendy leaned in just barely and pressed her mouth to his forehead. 

That got him crying again but it sounded a little like relief this time. Wendy held him and moved down to his temple, brushed her lips against the scar. She hadn’t planned on lingering too long on his lips so as to not push her luck. But he kissed back. It was slow and sweet, almost fucking romantic. She could have sworn it was a better high than anything she’d ever felt.

He kept at it for at least a couple of minutes before she pulled away to kiss at his neck. Some of his beard went even that far down but her hand was going down further. She set it on his inner thigh and rubbed him like she knew he liked.

“Yo, you don’t...don’t gotta do that.”

He didn’t sound all that convincing but still sincere, considerate but like he still wanted it. And if that wasn’t Jesse Pinkman, she didn’t know what was. 

“I want to,” she said.

It was one of the first times she meant it, which made it easy cupping him over his jeans. He was panting in her ear. Working down the zipper, she was sort of surprised how hard he was. 

But that was nothing compared to the sound he made when she bent down and took his cock in her mouth: still hushed but a moan so needy and raw and desperate it was like no one had ever pleasured him before. 

She only sucked a few times before he came. And she’d already wiped her mouth clean by the time he tucked himself back in his pants.

“Sorry, yo, I should of”--

Wendy shrugged. “Just like the old days, right?”

He chuckled. Then started coughing like his lunges weren’t used to laughing.  _ Fuck  _ did that make her want to scream.

She wished she could go back to when she’d met him, back when he was just out of high school, blowing his load in under forty-five seconds and only starting to dip his nose in the hard stuff. Back when she used to see him between girlfriends and sometimes they didn’t even screw just talked. But what the hell would she have even told him? She was a whore for fuck’s sake. 

Wendy hugged him ‘cause she wanted to real bad.

He rested his head against her shoulder and she rubbed at his forehead before trying to run her fingers in his hair. Except it was real matted, tangled in dirty knots almost like a teddy bear someone had left on the side of the road. But that didn’t stop her from reaching his scalp and softly scratching like how she knew he liked it. He’d always been a sucker for a head massage.

And now wasn’t too much different. She could feel him practically melting in her arms.

“Yo,” he said, groggy and muffled against the thin cushion shit of her jacket. “Glad you’re here. Missed you.”

She held her breath until his evened out and she knew he was asleep. Then she cried, quiet like he’d done before because she’d had to learn too a long time ago. She cried until she couldn’t see a damn thing, just slotted her fingers between his, squeezed him and cried.

\---

Wendy didn’t sleep, eat, let a single fucker touch her for nearly three days. She screamed into her mattress and sobbed. She gnawed her fingernails down to the quick and got some sudden sick urge to pick at her skin until it bled even though she was sober. She couldn’t even look at crystal and that only made her body feel all the more hellish and hot and itchy and like her own rib-cage didn’t fit comfortably inside her body like she needed to get out somewhere. She thought about killing herself but that somehow made it seem like Jesse would be even more alone. Somebody had to know. Even if she was too stupid to do anything, somebody had to know at least.

She could barely think on anything too long or hard. And when sleep did come it was nightmares: Jesse drowning down in that cage or starving. 

She started hanging around dinners full of cops, outside their bars, even on the corner of a police station so long she was almost fucking arrested for loitering. Though she was pretty sure it was really ‘cause she was scaring the business jackasses by just fucking being there, chain-smoking and looking about as pale as her cigarettes. She told them to fuck off anyways. 

The next night she packed up all her shit in her leopard print duffel and flipped the Palace the bird as she walked the hell out of there.

\---

Next time they saw each other they were both clean in more ways than one. Though neither of them smelled all that much better: Wendy like a cab and Jesse reeking of at least three different colognes like he’d become a goddamn gigolo. But her lazy-ass boss actually got her taxi deep-cleaned or detailed or something. The back seat was pretty comfortable, heater working, and no one leaving the A & W/KFC needed a ride. 

Jesse’s shorn head felt prickly but nice against her cheek.

He rubbed her knee. “Flared jeans? Yo, yo going to a disco later?”

Wendy hadn’t had her legs on this side of a pair of bluejeans in decades. 

“You look like a bald baby in a fucking family Christmas card.”

Jesse laughed real deep and rumbly and hard too. “Bitch.”

He’d be the only one she’d let call her that without kicking in the crotch. He made the word sound sweet somehow. Besides, he wasn’t being serious. She wasn’t either. His white turtleneck was nice.

“You look handsome, Jesse,” she said.

He glanced up from where he was leaning on her shoulder and smiled just like she’d remembered. 

“You look good too; happy,” Jesse said. “Yo, I’m like really fucking excited for you. This is awesome.”

He made a vague gesture around them. 

“I’m just a cab driver, not Miss America.”

Jesse didn’t break eye contact. “Still. Shit wasn’t easy. Wendy, yo, you’re a total badass.”

She wanted to say he was the one who’d escaped from a gang of Nazi dick-heads but she’d rather get conned out of getting tipped for a half hour ride to the airport again or something then bring that shit up. Driving a cab could be a pain in the ass most of the time but it wasn’t hooking. Her hours were pretty much the same ‘cause she worked nights. She made more money especially ‘cause she’d been off the pipe for over a month.

“I got my own place a couple blocks down from your old high school. It’s real small. Somebody got mugged a few doors down the other night but they didn’t even have a knife or anything. It’s alright though, got a bright orange door.”

“Yeah, I know. I looked there first, remember?” he said, smiling. “I like it. Yo, you got a fucking big orange cat too, right?”

Wendy didn’t understand exactly how he’d found her other than he’d asked around and there was only one A & W left in all of New Mexico. But she wasn’t too focused on that when he knocked on her window catching her wolfing down a root beer float and side of cheese fries. It scared the shit out of her until she realized who it was. And then she’d sort of basically forced him into the backseat with her and maybe she cried or whatever at first until she could calm the hell down. They’d been just cuddling back here for near an hour. 

“The cat showed up at my door howling for food. She’s fat but nice, doesn’t scratch or anything.”

Wendy left out how she’d named her Jessie. 

“Yo, that’s cool. I’m thinking of getting a dog soon, maybe a big one like a husky or something.” 

“A husky would get real hot in Albuquerque,” she said.

He gave her a sad kind of smile. “Yeah, I know.”

She held onto him a little tighter, sort of wanting to cry but knowing it was smart he got out of town with the cops looking for him. They sat there in this comfortable way not talking anymore. And when he held her hand, she knew it was time for him to go.

Wendy followed him out of the car before she got back in the front seat. Rolling down the window, she motioned him closer.

She gave him just a peck on the cheek. 

Maybe it was something about the parking lot lights but it almost looked like he sort of blushed. 

“Be careful, Jesse,” she said. 

“You too.” He smiled. Tapping the lip of the driver’s window, he nodded. “Thanks, Wendy.”

She didn’t stick around to watch him walk off ‘cause it would have fucking killed her. Pulling out of her parking spot, she took a right out of the lot before stopping at a red light. She had a few sips of her float left, and when she set her empty cup down she noticed a small paper bag in the passenger seat: too big for drugs but too small for most bombs. Plus she didn’t know anybody who’d want to blow up her cab. 

Anyhow, she was too curious not to open it. And when she did she nearly choked even though her throat was empty. 

But she was holding a wad of cash wrapped in rubber bands, had to be at least ten grand. Inside was a folded Taco Bell napkin that just said, “For Wendy. Keep being a badass bitch. Love you, Jesse.”

Wendy put her hand to her mouth. But it was weird ‘cause she couldn’t cry. She kind of wanted to but she was laughing a little instead. 

The light turned green and some uppity dick in a BMW was really laying on his horn so Wendy got going. She gently slid the money back in the bag wishing he would have let her thank him. But of course he didn’t. 

Wendy lit up a cigarette. 

“Bitch,” she said.

Taking a drag, she smiled. 


End file.
